Memorial Artwork

Sculptural Memorial

Reparative

Deese, Willie

Unmarked memorial for Willie Deese

After 19 years spent working for the athletic department of Davidson College, Willie Deese died in an automobile accident on March 25, 1972. His funeral was held a week later on April 1, 1972 at Torrence Chapel AME Zion Church in Cornelius. The Reverend E.W. Hayes officiated the funeral. Many of Willie Deese's family members attended, including his wife, Susie Deese, his sons Fred E. Deese and John L. Deese, his daughter Ophelia Alexander, his mother Sarah Caldwell, and two other family members Mary Lee Burley and Catherine Jones.

Deese was buried that same day in the Torrence Chapel AME Zion Church cemetery, although his grave is unmarked. The unmarked status of his grave has been physically confirmed by walking through the grounds of the cemetery. He is assumed to be in a patch of raised grass diagonally to the left of the graves of two of his relatives: his son John L. Deese and Mary L. Deese.

Shortly after his death, Willie Deese was memorialized in the March 31st issue of The Davidsonian. Deese's supervisors commended his hard work maintaining the grounds of the athletic department and praised his reliability and friendly demeanor.5 In a subsequent issue of The Davidsonian, his son and daughter-in-law, Mr. and Mrs. Fred Deese, the former of whom also worked on Davidson's campus, expressed their gratitude for the support given to their family by the faculty and staff at Davidson College following his death.

Unmarked memorial covered with grass presumably located to diagonal left of the grave of Mary Deese, his spouse who died in October of 1972.

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Family and Friends of Willie Deese

Deese, Willie

April 1, 1972

1945-1976: Era of Civil Rights Movement and resistance to Civil Rights Movement

Friends and Family of Willie Deese

Davidson College; Davidson, North Carolina

Charlie Terrell, "Willie Deese Dies in Auto Accident," The Davidsonian, March 31, 1972, 7.

"Willie Deese," The Charlotte News (Charlotte, NC), March 30, 1972, 18A.

Mr. and Mrs. Fred Deese, "Letter to the Editor," The Davidsonian, April 7, 1972, 4.

“Death Certificate of Willie Deese, 3/25/72, Certificate no. 10997,” accessed in Ancestry.com.